You Su Yu and the others heard Su Wenjing’s speech and were momentarily at a loss for words.
Although Su Wenjing had just listed a long string of reasons, those final words fell upon their ears with only one resonant feeling.
‘What a super love-brain!’
The fox clan’s underlying logic — that identifying a lover meant a commitment for a lifetime — indeed made it easy for love-brains to emerge.
You Su Yu immediately recalled the various emotional disputes she had mediated within the fox clan.
She also remembered the stories from the memories Su Wenjing had shared — small tales from the future of one fox after another falling in love with members of other races.
There were all sorts of situations where, as the relationship progressed, one would die and the other would refuse to go on living…
As a result, the number of survivors in the entire clan eventually became pitifully small.
You Su Yu covered her face in agony.
Looking at it this way, Su Wenjing seemed somewhat normal. At least he had found someone at the transcendence stage and was striving to improve himself rather than suddenly dropping dead…
Thinking of this, You Su Yu suddenly paused.
She recalled the scene of Su Wenjing and Li Yunxian appearing together in Qingqiu the last time.
…Forget it. Su Wenjing’s love wasn’t normal either.
The elders all looked like they lacked the strength to even complain.
Li Yunxian, hearing Su Wenjing’s words, could not help but laugh.
She sneakily reached out and brushed against Su Wenjing’s fingers.
Immediately, Su Wenjing grabbed Li Yunxian’s hand, clutching it tightly within his palm.
Her fingers felt a slight dampness.
Clearly, Su Wenjing had been so nervous while saying those things that his palms were sweating.
Li Yunxian’s gaze softened. She squeezed Su Wenjing’s hand back and responded, “Okay, we will ascend together.”
The elders: …
Please do not show off your affection in front of dead people!
What was the difference between this and dancing on someone’s grave?!
“Alright, alright, stop showing off these goosebump-inducing things in front of us!”
“There is so much to do outside. Wenjing, aren’t you supposed to go repair those spirit power sources? Hurry up and go,” You Su Yu said with great disdain.
Su Wenjing, who was in high spirits after receiving Li Yunxian’s response, finally snapped back to reality upon hearing You Su Yu’s words.
Su Wenjing cleared his throat and asked in a low voice, “Um… Aunt, do you all have any suggestions on how to restore these spirit power sources?”
You Su Yu: …
The elders: …
So you didn’t just come here to give us a notification!
At this moment, the way they looked at Su Wenjing was like looking at a bratty child telling them he had come back after causing a disaster!
Facing these glares, Su Wenjing explained with some embarrassment, “Currently, other than me, no living cultivators outside have ever seen these spirit power sources.”
“Other than spirit stone veins, they don’t understand anything else. No one can give me advice…”
You Su Yu and the others were helpless. “…Fine. First, let’s talk about the condition of the spirit power sources you dismantled.”
And so, Li Yunxian and Su Wenjing stayed in the secret realm for another two years.
When they finally left the secret realm and returned to the environment of the heaven’s ruins, Li Yunxian and Su Wenjing looked at the messy scene before them and felt as if a lifetime had passed.
Su Wenjing couldn’t help but look back at Qingqiu, which was still firmly situated within the heaven’s ruins.
The people and things he knew so well had just been vividly talking and saying goodbye to him a moment ago. In the blink of an eye, they were all left behind in that illusory hill.
Li Yunxian could understand this feeling.
She chose to accept and shoulder the burden, continuing to stride forward, meeting more people, and keeping them all within her memories.
But Su Wenjing was different.
After the great war of righteousness and demons, he could not face the departure of so many important people. He had chosen to isolate himself from the world, facing it with detachment.
It wasn’t a matter of right or wrong, and Li Yunxian had no way to counsel Su Wenjing. She simply reached out and took his hand.
Feeling the warmth, Su Wenjing regained his composure and looked at the calm Li Yunxian standing beside him.
This time, it was Su Wenjing’s turn to grip back.
Su Wenjing’s heart stabilized.
He had once again found the strength to support himself as he moved forward.
Meanwhile, Fu Ling, who was watching all of this: …
She had gone out of her way to welcome them, thinking that because Qingqiu was still there, Su Wenjing had failed to retrieve the marker!
Fu Ling’s lips twitched, but she still asked with concern, “Are you two alright?”
“We’re fine. It went very smoothly,” Li Yunxian replied.
Fu Ling was stunned. She looked up again at Qingqiu.
After confirming she hadn’t miscounted and the thing was indeed still there, she looked at Li Yunxian with eyes full of confusion. “Smoothly?”
Li Yunxian nodded. Omitting a series of unimportant details, she informed Fu Ling of the plan to restore the spiritual power of the entire Shenzhou.
Currently, in Shenzhou, aside from one person at the mahayana stage, the strongest in terms of cultivation were people like Fu Ling — cultivators at the integration Grand completion stage.
Fu Ling was undoubtedly part of Shenzhou’s high-level leadership; she was qualified to know these things.
Fu Ling was dazed by Li Yunxian’s words, unable to react for a long time.
After struggling to process what Li Yunxian was saying, Fu Ling’s entire head began to throb.
She recalled the time Li Yunxian was causing trouble at Pingnan Academy, which had forced the high-level officials of the four great academies to work collective overtime.
During the years Li Yunxian and Su Wenjing were inside the secret realm, Fu Ling, who had stayed outside, had actually felt quite bored.
Thinking back now, she realized how ungrateful she had been! She hadn’t known how to cherish the peace!
With a bit of deduction, Fu Ling could already feel how much work the changes brought by a sudden increase in Shenzhou’s spiritual power would add to her plate.
How much overtime would she have to work!
Fu Ling felt her head aching.
Why was it that every matter Li Yunxian brought back was more troublesome than the last… wait, no.
Technically, this time it should be said that Su Wenjing brought the matter back.
Fu Ling’s gaze fell on their still-joined hands.
These two… they really shouldn’t be a match made in heaven for this kind of thing!
It took several minutes for Fu Ling to calm herself. She took a deep breath and asked Su Wenjing, “Didn’t you say before that you had smashed all the blessed lands on Shenzhou?”
Su Wenjing did not deny it. He said honestly, “If I hadn’t said that, no one would have let me go.”
“And I did smash them. Some are confirmed to be beyond recovery.”
“Only eight blessed lands that exist within my space still have a chance of being saved.” Su Wenjing’s space talent had been used for this purpose back then.
No one could verify if what Su Wenjing said was true or false.
Fu Ling was speechless and had to admit that Su Wenjing had a point.
She calmed down completely. After a bit of thought, she also had to admit that with the increasing frequency of the Xingji Exchange, restoring the overall spiritual power of Shenzhou was indeed a good thing.
“…Let’s go back first and have a meeting with everyone,” Fu Ling said weakly.
She couldn’t be the only one suffering over this matter that would require decades or even a hundred years of overtime!
Neither Li Yunxian nor Su Wenjing had any objections.
The three of them left the heaven’s ruins and used shukudi chengcun to reach the capital city directly.
However, when they opened their eyes and looked at the capital, they were all taken aback.
The entire capital looked completely different from when they had left a few years ago.
The decoration styles of various buildings, the communication devices people held in their hands, and the vehicles driving on the ground or flying in mid-air all seemed to have undergone a round of upgrades.
By now, six or seven years had passed since Li Yunxian’s group had gone to the heaven’s ruins.
And the people on the streets were even more different.
In the past, no matter the city — even the capital — the majority of those active in the city were always ordinary people.
But now…
Over 70% were cultivators.
Although most were still at the Qi Refining stage.
But being able to cultivate and not being able to cultivate were two entirely different things.
Su Wenjing immediately understood what was happening. He turned to Li Yunxian. “It’s the effect of your medicinal baths.”
Li Yunxian looked around with curiosity and nodded. She also noticed several Lishi-authorized four arts shops on the roadside.
Various elixirs, symbol talismans, array disks, and zhifu magical tools were displayed in the shops.
Some of them Li Yunxian didn’t even recognize.
They weren’t things Li Yunxian had provided.
After so many years, this world had finally developed new things based on the foundation of the cultivation world.
What was with that “no-desire anti-internet addiction dedicated study happy family future hope pill”?
Is that really a proper elixir?
Why does it feel like some shoddy product used to trick parents…
Li Yunxian hesitated to speak.
However, now was not the time to worry about such things. The three of them only briefly felt the changes in the capital before heading straight into the academic office.
Except for Li Yunxian, who was currently unemployed, the other two were official employees of the academic office. Naturally, they would report any matters to the office first.
After hearing what these people were looking for him for, the academic office test director: …
He did not feel any sense of honor regarding this.
“I will organize a grand meeting for the high-level officials of all departments,” he said weakly, continuing with a bit of dark humor, “It’s a good time for a change anyway. The current cities can’t keep up with the development.”
“We might as well redo everything together…”
The notice was soon sent out.
The sudden grand meeting caught everyone off guard.
High-level officials from various departments and industries urgently checked with each other to find out what was happening.
In the end, no one knew.
The fewer the words, the bigger the matter.
A situation like this, without even a single sentence of explanation, was the biggest of the big.
Everyone arrived at the capital immediately with solemn expressions.
Li Tianying was among the high-level industry officials notified to attend.
She saw her student sitting primly in the large conference hall before her.
Well, there was no surprise and no accident — or rather, everything was a surprise and an accident.
It was Li Yunxian.
Li Tianying: …
Before she even had time to be happy about seeing her student again or that her student hadn’t surpassed her fenshen stage, Li Tianying felt that she understood something.
Li Tianying’s solemn and incredulous voice reached Li Yunxian’s ears.
“You dismantled the heaven’s ruins?!” Li Tianying said.
Li Yunxian: …
Li Yunxian: …
Was her image in her teacher’s heart a bit too terrifying?
She fell into deep thought.
Li Yunxian silently leaked some information to her teacher first.
Now it was Li Tianying’s turn to be speechless.
She finally knew why she had been called here.
“…Fortunately, after connecting with the interstellar side, I already managed to get the ‘town-guarding modification’ done.”
At least the burden of overtime wouldn’t be too heavy on her end.
Li Tianying was satisfied.
“I knew it, nothing good happens whenever you’re involved,” Li Tianying complained.
Since it wasn’t her student causing trouble and the overall event was a good thing, Li Tianying’s heart eased.
However, Li Tianying felt like something was slightly off.
As if she had overlooked something.
Come to think of it…
Why didn’t her student come over to find her after she arrived? Instead, she was sitting with Professor Su Wenjing?
Li Tianying was slightly puzzled for a few seconds, but her attention was quickly drawn away by greetings from others.
The many took their seats, and they soon heard the theme of the meeting.
Everyone: …
No matter how much they had speculated, they had never imagined it would be such a major event.
Not knowing whether to cry or laugh, they could only begin discussing the solution to this headache of a matter.
First, they had to decide which location to start repairing the spirit power sources from.
A sudden increase in spiritual power would affect the surrounding cities and the other races active in those areas. All of this had to be discussed and predicted in advance to create solutions.
Then there was the schedule for the remaining spirit power sources, which also required discussion.
After going through another month of meetings of varying sizes, Li Yunxian felt her head was spinning.
But as long as the final result was achieved, it could be considered a success.